Last time, we spent our time whaling on a purple rat mage and stealing reclaiming a wand that was clearly, obviously someone else's. This update will be a tad on the shorter side, primarily due to meta reasons,* and focus a bit more on story advancement and a little exploration of the overworld.
Now... Where were we...?
- Then go back into the castle to talk to the king of cats.
... Right, that would be a good place to start...
So, according to our guide, we're supposed to...
- From the outside it is teaching the stones on the menu. Which is used for more detailed information such as the monsters are found. In cases where the dungeon is full or not.
- Walked to the man who has a band around the square and the entrance to the castle. Talk to him and the Magic Heart Peace.
- Back into the castle. Talk to the king and the Magic Heart Cure.
- And then casting ひょう けつ Ice.
... Get more lessons on how to suck less at fighting? Let's start by talking to this guard from last time, seeing as he's got a yellow exclamation point over his head. Talking to the guard triggers a short exchange conversation sprites between Oliver, Shizuku, and the guard, but nothing really important seems to be- Oh. He opened the door. Convenient! Seeing as we've already scoured the first two rooms for treasures in the last update and smashing the pots demonstrates that NO, this is NOT Dragon Quest 9, so you don't get rewarded for repeat vandalism. On our way out of the second room, we stop to yack a little with slacker's clone... Who has one whopping set of lines... Let's move onto room 3.
Here we see an animated cutscene with Oliver and Shizuku walking into the throne room of Jabba the Hutt in a fursuit that morbidly obese cat-king who bears more than a passing resemblance to that one cat we saw back at the grocery store. The scene opens up with the king being generally disinterested in us, and being a bum, then abruptly having a change of heart and going up to sniff us while making Oliver look like he's about to wet himself... A few more words and personal space invasions later, the king gets annoyed at us for some reason. Considering that Oliver was mouthing things to Shizuku under his breath, it might have been his fault, and proceeds to go back to his throne and loaf some more while ignoring us.
Afterwards, we exit the cutscene, and- HOLY ISH, THE VAS ARE BACK! Oliver asks Shizuku a question, and winds up getting an answer that startles him quite a bit... Oliver and Shizuku's VAs yack a little more... And then... We get prompted to leave? Okay, then...
On our way through the final room before the gate, the game takes over and has Oliver and Shizuku yack a bit on a walkway with some catpaw tiles. No VAs this time though... And it is at this point that that rock that we got from the tree in update 2 pops out of Oliver's magical bag of holding, giving Oliver and Shizuku a good scare. The stone tablet yacks a bit more and drops a highlighted term composed of 8 katakana. The next couple of lines have something about hearts... The term in red reappears without highlighting... Uh... The conversation wraps up shortly afterwards, and we're freed to chase our red arrows.
Heading back into the plaze, one of the first things that you'll notice on the top screen is that one of the NPC dots is flashing.. Guess we're talking to that guy in a bit... On our way in, Oliver makes a short comment, and then we proceed to use our handy 4th wall violator to waltz up to the NPC... But the game takes over for us as we draw near... Shizuku speaks a bit, presumbly saying "Hey! It's that guy! You know, the one that you needed to find!" in slightly fancier terms. We go up to a gray-haired NPC with an orange shirt and- ... Wait a minute... That's hillbilly armor! ... Minus the broom and other junk he had earlier... Oliver and the kid talk a bit... Hillbilly armor says a lot of moonspeak... I caught "adults" out of that... And eventually Shizuku butts in and we're prompted to cast a spell... Uh...
- Walked to the man who has a band around the square and the entrance to the castle. Talk to him and the Magic Heart Peace.
Right, Heart Peace...
◊ A couple tries later, we make one good enough to appease the game, get a cut to our little perfume bottle and... Get prompted to head back for the castle again? Okay...
By following the arrows careful deduction, we can conclude that we're supposed to return to the throne room... Which in its non-animated state, is only marginally less lovely than it was in the cutscene. But alas, we have a kitty to pester, the exclamation point even confirms it!
Going up to talk with the cat king nets us a "Why on earth are you here?"-looking sprite. Shizuku and Oliver yack again, and we're prompted to crack out that stylus again. According to our beloved guide, we're supposed to cast Heart Cure... And then... An Ice spell?
Sketching out a Heart Cure
◊ triggers a little chiming sound and a notice. And causes a golden... Thing to materialize out of the cat thing and go to Oliver. Which triggers an "item get" jingle. Oliver and Shizuku's VAs yack a bit, and the cat king's joins in on the fun. Slacker pulls an offscreen ninja and runs in... Apparently awed at our handiwork. The cat king blabs a little more, slacker says something at a pace typically reserved for people leading auctions... And continues on with something that apparently gives Garfield here a start. A couple lines further, and our lardo friend returns his attention to Oliver. Slacker chimes in and then leaves, and Shizuku makes a brief comment probably amounting to "Good job!", or for all I know, it was something obscene and memetic involving Seaking.*
Slacker walks in with something... Oh. It's apparently rat boy's wand... Garfield seems a bit happier, and finally smiles... Kinda. And we item get... A wand? Hmm... Looks like there might be a purple chest with our name on it... (In a future update, unfortunately, life is being too uncooperative for major in-game tangents at the moment.) Oliver says thanks for the wand, tabby puts in a few more words... Oliver brings up "Jabo," which is highlighted for our convenience. Which causes Garfield to look like he just squatted on something pointy and uncomfortable. The cat king yacks a bit more... And it is at this point that I realize "for a blimp, that cat sure is high pitched"... A few more words, and Oliver and Shizuku turn to leave, but get interrupted by the king... And the VAs crap out after about 4 more text boxes. We get a highlighted phrase with two Kanji... I think the first's related to water... No wait, scratch that... Ice.
And this is the part where we sketch an Ice Spell. It looks like this
◊, and is located on page 52 of Trope-Tan.
After a few tries, we manage to make an ice spell that the game accepts, and have some unvoiced blurbs by the king, Oliver, and Shizuku. A phrase consisting of 3 katakana and 2 Kanji pops up... Something about a forest... And we turn to leave... And get prompted to choose whether or not to save. Let's hit yes.
Red arrows... What now, guide?
- Follow the red arrow to store weapons. You will be able to put the weapon or armor.
- Out of the Basin was the scene map.
- Walk to the bottom. The red arrow. Into the forest to the south.
Huh. Sounds like Falco decided that he likes making money after all, let's get moving then! After following a series of arrows to the weapons shop we get some lines by our beloved crow-man... Shizuku drops a 7 kana phrase in red made out of katakana, first one is "a" (ア)... Which causes Falco blab some more and Oliver to ask what that phrase meant... And we item get an icon denoted by 4 hiragana. With an icon consisting of two swords. So yeah, weapons time. The shopkeeper drops 2 further red phrases. The first is something consisting of 3 hiragana and 3 katakana, the second is that same string of 7 from earlier. Oh! We got a new menu icon! Now we can equip stuff, apparently. (It's the one that looks like clothes next to the birdcage.) We get prompted to give Rucci something other than that steak knife to hold... Our options are that black whip, a pair of swords (oh, so we item got those swords from earlier), and... A rock... Since the whip boosts Rucci's already mental Physical Attack stat the most, let's give him that.
The crow yacks a little more. Shizuku takes the time to butt in a little before the crow gives us a parting comment, and we're prompted to head out. Hmm... Let's screw around with those items some more... There's 2 tabs, one for imagines, one for other party members. Taillow has 2 items, one boosting Physical Defense by a lot with a minor speed boots with the other giving a larger speed boost and a dinky defense boost... Since Taillow has some rather lacking stats, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to guess what we chose. Both Taillow and Rucci have 4 item slots... But 3 are blanked out right now... Oliver and Shizuku apparently have no items that are equippable right now. You can buy something from Falco now if you want, just keep in mind that the cheapest thing that he sells is 100G, which is over a tenth of the amount of cash we presently have on hand. So we'll be saving those weapons for when we're richer or otherwise have mugged more Pokemon rejects.
The NPCs by the hotel apparently changed... There's an old woman by the town wall who after a long series of text boxes will ask you a question... Right, left, or... Somthing... Let's go with left. Uh... More questions... Middle one has something to do with... "Outside?" And there's another... Uh... Eeny Meeny Miney, Oh, let's just go with the middle again. Hmm... Looks like those weren't the things we were supposed to tell her... You can retry, apparently, but that will be something to save for another time... There's a cat NPC who will give you a quest in the northwest, but the one you should be looking for is the blinking one in the southwest, who is visibly younger. The NPC talks with you a bit, and then Oliver gets a strange green flash on his body. After apparently asking what on earth happened, Oliver gets an answer what freaks him out a bit... And... ... Magic time. Uh... Let's go with Heart Peace... Looks like that was what the NPC wanted! ... Maybe... He didn't seem UPSET about it, and we saw our perfume bottle again. Following the arrows takes us outside of the town...
We then get a transition to a cutscene involving 3 knights... One in black armor with a purple cape, 2 in gray with blue capes. They're apparently at the first savepoint we had in the game. (That cliff where Oliver was looking out over the plains.) The three each say a single line (unvoiced), and the game cuts back to the overworld. Uh... Right, southern forest... It is here that we make the important discovery that some forests ARE passable after all. We notice a sparkling thing and... Get an egg? It is also at this point that we realize how GROSSLY overleveled we are relative to the monsters around here. Those same monsters that dealt 7-8 HP damage a pop on our way over to town now deal 1... In the first row... (To Rucci, anyways.) And can generally be downed in 1-2 turns. After some exploration, we quickly discover that there's two primary ways to find items in the overworld: via red chests (which tend to be hidden in alcoves near cliffs) and glinting blue specks on the overworld.
Heading south, across a river, we see the arrow we're supposed to be heading for, and bump into a new enemy in the process... Which looks kinda like a orange and yellow cross between a Flareon and a Vaporeon, and a pink bipedal elephant with yellow bird feet and purple armor over parts of its body, mostly its trunk. Both creatures can hit behind meatshields, the former can tank our attacks by assuming a defensive position (but will still go down in one turn if ganged up on), and latter has a (weak) move that hits ALL movement cells. Our buddies from above the river are also here, if you wanted to harass some easier prey. As we head towards the arrow, we notice mushrooms... Lots and lots of mushrooms.
Heading into the forest, Oliver and Shizuku talk a bit... Shizuku freaks out. Oh... Cute, we have a fungal roadblock... Which apparently cuts off the direct (offscreen) route to wherever we're supposed to go. Since this is apparently a dungeon (the save button is locked) and it's apparently an ungodly hour, let's backtrack and save at the overworld.
Takeaway Points:
- If a NPC dot on your top screen is flashing, odds are that he/she/it is important enough to merit talking to.
- You can access and equip items on Imagines and other characters in your party via the leftmost menu icon in the second row.
- The cat king of the town we spent the last few updates in is a nose picker. Because that was totally a relevant piece of information that is indicative of his leadership. Also, he's apparently
racistleery of hiring other catfolk to be guards. - Rucci is rapidly approaching
sexy shoeless god of warteam MVP status. It will be interesting to see what other Imagines Ni no Kuni throws at us, seeing as there's supposed to be a couple hundred to collect in-game. - Say it with me: Ni no Kuni is NOT Dragon Quest IX. (For one, it's around ten times prettier.) That said, many of its interface and gameplay elements ARE rather similar. So if you've played one, the other may seem familiar to you.
- Ni no Kuni's VAs and Studio Ghibli's artists apparently share a union. They only seem to really appear in non-repeating instances in-game (e.x. battle grunting) in tandem.
- That wand really was someone else's. We weren't lying! See?
Stats:
- Oliver: Level 9: 54(/60) HP / 38 MP
- Rucci:: Level 10: 72(/83) HP / 36 MP
- Taillow: Level 10: 63(/68) HP / 30 MP *
- G: 1061.
- Play Time: 15 hours, 19 minutes, 13 seconds.
Next time, we will plumb the depths of a dungeon. And see whether or not Ni no Kuni has a Mushroomization status effect.
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